About two decades ago, in reviewing various films, I pointed out that all fantasy movies have exactly the same plot. The last two Avengers movies follow the formula almost perfectly.
Here is my official outline of the Universal Plot:
In order to gain all power in the universe, the Full Rizzuto, it is necessary to re-unite all the pieces of the Holy Cow, as written in the sacred Book of Ish in the scriptures of forgotten Kabibble. This is an opportunity that only occurs every 5,000 years, so the Insane Evil Dude has to act fast before the Cosmic Offer expires, and infinite power returns to its regular price. The Insane Evil Dude, who has almost finished assembling the Holy Cow, is usually an old white guy who plans to use the Full Rizzuto to create tax breaks for the rich, safaris, corporate golf outings, Republican fund raisers, and other stuff that evil old white guys like.
The muscle-bound good guys must prevent him from doing this. The good guys have something that helps them, like a magic sword, or a piece of the Holy Cow, or the Sacred Key to Kyser, ancient college of all musical knowledge. The Kyser Key is the only force in the universe more powerful than the Full Rizzuto.
Simply change the proper nouns, and you have your own fantasy adventure.
For example:
In the case of the Avengers saga, the Holy Cow is called the Infinity Gauntlet, the pieces of it are called the infinity stones, and the Full Rizzuto is (as usual) infinite power. The Kyser Key is a time machine.
The Avengers saga has only two real variations from the universal plot, and they seem minor when considered within the big picture:
(1) The Insane Evil Dude is not acting in his own self interest. He’s even more insane than that. (Hint to Thanos: instead of using the Infinity Gauntlet to halve the population of the universe, use it instead to double the size and resources – same exact result without all that pesky murder!)
(2) The Insane Evil Dude actually succeeds in obtaining infinite power, so the good guys must use the Kyser Key to undo his actions rather than to prevent them.
Hey, it’s the characters not the plot…that matter.
Just remember, scoops unities are based on Tolkien’s ring trilogy that invented the whole Holy Cow genre, and all subsequent Holy Cow movies are a variation of this.
I think I remember scoop mentioning this in his review of the trilogy.